‘Scuse me, but this statement is wholly absurd: “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place,” said Eric Schmidt, then Google’s chief executive, in 2009.

First, the assumption that the only reason someone might not want to be photographed in public by some random stranger is because they are doing something they should not be doing is ludicrous. Second, the assumption that simply because we are slowly being provided with the technology that allows us to invade other people’s privacy anytime we feel like it means that we therefore should invade their privacy whenever we feel like it, is lunacy. Third, the assumption that everyone needs or wants to be a voyeur, despite what devotees of such practices might want to believe in order to justify their own tendencies, is wishful thinking on the part of a company primed to make a lot of money by convincing everyone that they are indeed – if only they knew it to be true, they would be free! – voyeurs. Fourth, the assumption that this endless recording of every bon mot, moment and activity we each have is even slightly interesting, is, dare I say it, completely uninteresting. Fifth…well, I don’t need a Fifth assumption, Four is enough.

_Thad Starner, a pioneer of wearable computing who is a technical adviser to the Glass team, says he thinks concerns about disruption are overblown.

“Asocial people will be able to find a way to do asocial things with this technology, but on average people like to maintain the social contract,” Mr. Starner said. He added that he and colleagues had experimented with Glass-type devices for years, “and I can’t think of a single instance where something bad has happened.”_

Seriously, Mr. Starner? That’s only because the technology wasn’t widely available. People love to take pictures of themselves and everyone else and plaster them all over the place without any thought whatsoever to the consequences.

Just you wait Henry Higgins, just you wait. You’ll be sorry but your tears ‘ll be too late…

I’m looking at my watch now and counting down until someone jumps on this post and tells me that this is the way the world is going and there’s nothing any of us can do about it.

Ten, nine, eight, seven, six….

#GoogleGlass   #Privacy   #Photography   #Technology  

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/07/technology/personaltech/google-glass-picks-up-early-signal-keep-out.html?hp